Avenda Has A Knack For NAC

Company:

Headquarters: Santa Clara, Calif.

Technology Sector: Security

Key Product: Avenda eTIPS 5000 Series

Year Founded: 2006

Number of Channel Partners: 15 worldwide

Ideal Channel Partner: Enterprise Focused Solution Provider

Why You Should Care: Avenda takes the NAC space by storm with extra identity and policy management features.

The Lowdown: Avenda picks up where traditional NAC leaves off.

Founded in 2006 by former Cisco engineers, Avenda is making its name with its eTIPS flagship product-- a NAC product that comes equipped with a slew of additional capabilities, executives said.

eTIPS is designed to function well and integrate seamlessly with multivendor environments. The product also allows customers to incorporate a wider range of devices -- such as printers, handheld mobile phones, DVRs and game consoles-- that were previously considered "unmanageable," executives said.

"It's one of the reasons we're getting traction and attention. If you look at this space, products are relatively difficult to deploy," said Ron DiBiase, Avenda vice president of sales. "That was a big design goal, which was to try to overcome a lot of the problems customers have had with multivendor support."

In addition, eTIPS incorporates a comprehensive policy-based system for a wide array of internal and external compliance mandates.

"You're able to write more accurate policies, and not mistakenly lock someone out of the network who should be in the network," DiBiase said. "If that happens to the CEO, you end up losing your job as the IT security guy."

Avenda is looking to selectively recruit channel partners over the next 12 months, in particular those who focus on the enterprise and midmarket, as well as those who cater to the higher education vertical. Executives are aware of NACs' "ups and downs" but say that the company is expanding and demand thus far is strong for a stand-alone NAC product-- in part, due to its added identity and policy management features.